Kitchen Sinks and Taps

Faced with the multitude of kitchen sinks and taps on the market, we wanted to offer some general advice on what to look for, based on our experience of kitchen design since 2004.

Swan Neck Kitchen Taps

High spouted swan neck mixer taps are useful for filling kettles and pans easily. The swivel spout lets you slide a bucket underneath too, so it is very practical. The taps are easy to operate, even with messy hands. One of our clients with arthritis was delighted that we found a stylish tap for her that was so simple to use.

A brushed steel finish gives a smart contemporary look, but there are many other options available now, including black. We’ve carried out a lot of research into kitchen taps, and find this style unbeatable; we don’t look much further.

Flexible Kitchen Taps

Flexible kitchen taps are popular with cooking enthusiasts with their detachable nozzle for washing vegetables and spraying into the corners of the sink. This particular model has two spray settings, operated by the black button. The inner tube provides the tap’s flexibility, strengthened by the surrounding coil, which will need to be cleaned. With the nozzle in its housing, the tap reverts to a swan neck type described earlier.

Boiling taps and filtered water

Boiling taps are trendy, but you need to understand their installation and maintenance requirements. Check their water storage capacity in the cupboard beneath (you may find that you lose much of that space) and also the cost of maintenance, particularly in hard water areas where you need to change filters on a regular basis. Then there is the cost of storing water at the right temperature. Think carefully before falling in love with the idea.

Similarly with dedicated drinking water taps. If you have a water softener fitted, make sure that the drinking water tap remains unsoftened.

Kitchen sinks

Choose the largest bowl-and-a-half sink that will fit your kitchen. The catalogue specification will tell you the size of the base cabinet required. The separate half-bowl is useful for rinsing and pouring and you can leave rinsed containers to drain upside down in here whilst continuing to use the full bowl for washing. They are very practical. Check which side you want the half bowl as they do come left and right handed.

Undermount sinks

Undermount sinks look very stylish, typical of a high-end kitchen. If you choose a brushed steel tap, choose a brushed steel sink too.

Undermount sinks are fitted beneath a solid worktop (preferably a stone-type worktop – we’ll talk about wood later). They are not suitable for laminates because the worktop needs to be cut, exposing the chipboard core. Your supplier will cut drainage grooves in the surface of a stone worktop so be ready to say whether you’d want them to the left or to the right.

Although wood is a solid surface, we would not recommend having a wooden worktop anywhere that gets wet regularly. They look great in photos when brand new, but most people don’t maintain them. The wood becomes badly stained and split. For clients preferring wood, we would fit this remote from wet areas in combination with granite or quartz around the sink.

For an undermount sink with more than one bowl, the contractor templates the worktop to expose part of the top surface of the sink as below. The silicone sealant would be visible from above and, whilst anti-fungal, may discolour over time. If this happens, you should cut away and replace the silicone. For a single bowl, as in the square model above, the fitter would template the worktop so that it fits just over the edge of the sink; here the sealant is beneath the surface and so not visible from above.

Belfast sinks

Belfast sinks look fine in a traditional property, and also in some contemporary schemes. For fitted kitchens suppliers make a dedicated base unit for a Belfast sink but usually only in one size, whereas Belfast sinks come in a range of sizes. So check what combination will work before committing.

Moulded acrylic sinks

For an ultra-modern look, fabricators can mould an acrylic kitchen a sink as a “single piece” with its worktop, as in the island sink below. Manufacturers confirm that the solid acrylic is mould and stain resistant. There are certainly no obvious joins to seal or worry about. Acrylic does scratch, so carry out a test with a fingernail to make sure you are happy with it. Scratches can be dressed out, but you might want a specialist to do this for you after a period of use; or you might just live with it.

Stainless steel sink with drainer

For a cheaper alternative, you could choose a pressed stainless steel sink for your laminate worktop. Left or right handed, you will need to decide which side your drainer will sit. They also come in a range of configurations: single bowl; bowl and a half; twin bowl and so on. Often you’ll find kitchen sinks and taps come as a set for these cheaper items.

Macerators

Some clients fit macerators to dispose of food waste easily. They sit below the sink in the base unit, and activate automatically when you push waste down the plug hole. Again, check the space they take up in the cabinet below before deciding that this is right for you. Technical documents on line show how to fit them and the space they require.